


Four Friends Walk into a Bed

by Stellophia



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, And They Slept In It, Asexual Loki (Marvel), Bad Flirting, Banter, Bisexual Tony Stark, But Is Anyone Suprised Really, Crack, Domestic Fluff, Everyone Gets Cuddles, Flirting, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, Gen, Greysexual Bruce Banner, Humor, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Is Anyone Surprised By That Really, No Romance, No Smut, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Not Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Compliant, Pansexual Stephen Strange, Radical I Know, Self-Indulgent, Sleepy Cuddles, The Author Regrets Nothing, Tony Stark Flirts, and there was only one bed, at 3 AM, just platonic shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:14:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28411497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stellophia/pseuds/Stellophia
Summary: [Written for Marvellous Aces Holiday Bingo 2020 | prompt: There Was Only One Bed... And All They Did Was Sleep]“Boss, as well as Mr Banner, Laufeyson, and Strange, are currently sleeping together in Boss’s bedroom,” FRIDAY informs Steve nonchalantly.“Sleeping together… in Tony’s bed?" Steve repeats hesitantly, unsure if he heard it correctly. "All... four of them?”“Yes and yes, Mr Rogers.”“Does... Pepper... know this, FRIDAY?”“Yes, Ms Potts-Stark is well aware that the four of them were experimenting until well into the night."“...Experimenting?”“Yes, Mr Rogers,” the AI confirms calmly. “Extensively experimenting with magic, the Iron Man armour, several varieties of knives, and one Hulk.”It is at this point that Steve Rogers decides that he doesnotwant to know any further.Or: how an asexual god of chaos, a bisexual genius billionaire, a pansexual Sorcerer Supreme, and a graysexual scientist who occasionally turns into a green rage monster, may have accidentally scarred Steve Rogers forever via science shenanigans, flirting, terrible double entendres, and cuddles, courtesy of a superintelligent AI who is a little shit.
Relationships: Bruce Banner & Loki, Bruce Banner & Stephen Strange, Bruce Banner & Tony Stark, Loki & Stephen Strange, Loki & Tony Stark, Tony Stark & Stephen Strange
Comments: 17
Kudos: 153
Collections: Marvellous Aces Holiday Bingo 2020





	Four Friends Walk into a Bed

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [@marvellousaces'](https://marvellousaces.tumblr.com/post/636333268530233344/marvellous-aces-holiday-bingo-marvellous-aces) Marvellous Aces Holiday Bingo 2020 | prompt: there was only one bed... and all they did was sleep. But let's be real, it was written because my 3 AM brain wanted Loki to have platonic cuddles and maybe a sleepover.
> 
> This is set in an AU where Infinity War happens very differently; the Asgardians make it to Earth, nobody dies, Thanos loses and the snap (and Endgame) never happens. After which Loki is pardoned and Tony, Stephen, Loki and Bruce become close friends. That's all you need to know.
> 
> Title credit goes to the incredible [@worstloki.](https://archiveofourown.org/users/worstloki/pseuds/worstloki) They're amazing and have written several Ace!Loki fics themselves, so go read those!!
> 
> Rated T for language and mentions of sex, but there is zero (0) actual fonduing, graphic, referenced, or implied. 
> 
> Warning: EXTREME self-indulgence.

It's a simple, innocuous question, really.

It’s another normal Saturday, twelve-thirty in the afternoon, and nobody in the compound has seen either Bruce or Tony yet. Steve knows Tony often sleeps in late, but even for him, late means eleven, eleven-thirty at max. Bruce, on the other hand, is usually up very early, often before Steve wakes up himself, so it's very odd nobody has seen either of them around yet.

Steve is somewhat sure that he saw Loki and Stephen with the two of them last evening too, but Stephen usually portals himself back as soon as his job is done, and Loki disappearing in and out of the compound randomly isn’t exactly a new phenomenon, and he doesn’t think it prudent to ask, really.

So Steve asks FRIDAY a simple question: where are Tony and Bruce?

In retrospect, he _really_ shouldn't have.

“Boss, as well as Mr Banner, Laufeyson, and Strange, are currently sleeping together in Boss’s bedroom,” FRIDAY informs Steve nonchalantly.

“ _Sleeping together…_ in Tony’s bed?" Steve repeats hesitantly, unsure if he heard it correctly. "All... four of them?”

“Yes and yes, Mr Rogers.”

“Does... Pepper... know this, FRIDAY?”

“Yes, Ms Potts-Stark is well aware that the four of them were experimenting until well into the night.”

“...Experimenting?”

“Yes, Mr Rogers,” the AI confirms calmly. “Extensively experimenting with magic, the Iron Man armour, several varieties of knives, and one Hulk.”

It is at this point that Steve Rogers decides that he does _not_ want to know any further.

* * *

**Six hours ago:**

“Here’s a radical idea: we all need to go the fuck to sleep,” announces Stephen.

Tony looks away from the holographic blueprint of the new, magically shielded Iron Man armour he is manipulating to shoot Stephen a disappointed (and also very tired) look. “Come _on_ , Wizard Boy,” he groans. “The night’s still young!” 

If Loki is reasonably sure that the sun has, in fact, risen, he deigns not to mention it, instead focusing on— or more accurately, _trying_ to focus on — the energy readings displayed in front of him. 

He doesn’t exactly have the energy for this anymore, if he’s honest — his eyes are visibly drooping, his ponytail messy, his muscles aching, and Loki finds he doesn’t have the strength to don another glamour to keep up appearances. Besides, everyone else looks just as bad, if not much, much worse than him, so he’ll let it slide.

“It’s six-thirty in the morning, Tony,” Bruce informs them helpfully, shooting him a half-hearted and very exhausted glare. “And we’ve been at it since nine yesterday.”

Tony seems to want to argue the point, but is overcome by a large yawn before he can say something. 

“...Touché,” he admits, about as tired as everyone else despite his attempts to pretend to the contrary. And ‘about as tired as everyone else’ means very, very tired, even for Loki. Tired to the point not even additional doses of caffeine can help, and if Loki is counting correctly, Tony has had… about four cups already. 

"We really did go a bit overboard this time, didn’t we," Bruce sighs, rubbing his eyes tiredly.

 _Overboard_ , Loki notes, is certainly one way to describe it. 

"You _don't say_ ," Stephen snarks back. The Cloak of Levitation, which looks decidedly out of place over Stephen’s grey sweatshirt, flutters in agreement.

The workshop is… _trashed_ is an understatement. Utter _wreckage_ would perhaps be a better word. 

Pieces of vibranium and chunks of ripped nanite armour that may or may not have been a part of some Iron Man suit prototype or other once upon a time lie chief amongst the wreckage. Along with it are remnants of broken tables and chairs, walls with knives embedded deep into them, and the ruins of a minor magical explosion in one corner that they should have fixed by now by all means, but neither Stephen nor Loki found the motivation to. The vague stench of something burning permeates the room, and Loki isn’t even sure where it is coming from; they certainly didn’t set anything on fire yet, as far as he’s aware.

Well, they _tried_ safety precautions, of course; they always do. It really isn’t their fault they don’t work out.

“It was worth it, though,” Tony points out, a point Loki will have to agree to. “All the data JARVIS recorded is gonna go a long way in converting your magical Hogwarts hodge-podge to normal-people physics.”

Well, Tony did upgrade his Hulkbuster armour quite efficiently and test it out with the _actual_ Hulk, as well as manage to install and test out some anti-magic fields on the new Iron Man armour prototypes and try to get them to block, absorb, and/or even counter the magical attacks of both Stephen’s Mystic Arts and Loki’s seidr. And surprisingly, some of the later prototypes _did_ manage to absorb a groundbreaking ten to seventeen per cent of the incoming seidr blasts before having a hole blasted through them. 

It would be much higher, actually, if Loki weren't constantly messing with the molecular structure and arrangement of the suit’s nanites, but that’s for Tony to figure out himself. It’s still quite astounding progress for one night, Loki would admit. 

“Said magical Hogwarts hodge-podge _is_ advanced physics, Tony,” Loki points out.

“Says the literal god of fucking around with entropy, who can incidentally turn into a literal dragon.”

“Oh, so it’s my fault humans lack even the most elementary framework for understanding or describing—”

“Can we just go to sleep, please,” Bruce interrupts.

“Okay, but here’s the problem,” Tony pointedly points out, “the nearest bed is five floors and ten minutes away, and there’s _no_ way I’m walking.” 

Well, shit. _That's_ certainly a problem.

“You know, given the number of times you’ve spent the entire night here, I’m actually surprised it doesn’t have a bed here already,” Bruce muses, holding in another yawn.

“That’s because I sleep just fine on the countertop table over there—” Tony points to a miraculously still intact, if very, very littered, table to Loki’s right— “and I know exactly how to employ a number of horizontal and vertical surfaces to suit our purposes in case I have a… _lab partner_.”

“Unnecessary double entendres aren’t helping, Tony,” Stephen points out, blinking both in frustration and exhaustion. 

“Can’t you just teleport us?” Bruce asks Loki.

“Not unless you don’t want yourself stuck in the rifts between realms, in any case,” Loki replies, shrugging. “I’m far too tired for it to be safe.”

“How are you tired anyway?” Bruce questions, frowning. “Can’t Asgardians go longer without sleep?”

“I’ve been awake for the past six days,” he replies, and is suddenly made _very_ aware of the sheer _exhaustion_ in his muscles and bones. Granted, Loki has often gone much more than a measly one hundred and —forty-four? Loki can’t do the math right now— hours without sleep, of course, but that doesn’t mean he is enjoying it at this point. “My brother is a foolish idiot, and New Asgard isn’t going to rule itself.”

“...Only one option left, then.” Tony turns to Stephen, his expression conveying that he may have had the most brilliant stroke of genius in his life. “My dear Stephen, best Sorcerer Supreme ever—”

“ _No_ , I’m not portalling you.” He shakes his head in vehement refusal. “Why do you think _I_ have the energy remaining to portal you three idiots around?”

“Portal. Now.” 

“Fuck you, Stark.”

“Anytime you want, babe,” Tony replies, shooting him a half-hearted wink. “Now hurry up. I’m two minutes away from collapsing.”

"If you two idiots are _done_ ," Bruce groans. “I’d really like a magical Uber to bed, thank you very much.”

“Ugh. _Fine_.” Stephen reluctantly opens a portal to the tired cheers of the rest of the three.

“Oh, look.” Tony nods, stepping into the room across the portal. “My room. Thanks, Uber Wizard.”

It's an expansive room, Loki notes with drooping eyes, the furniture the same modernist style as the rest of the compound. The large, well-made bed has four _very fluffy_ looking pillows neatly arranged near its head, and a thick deep blue blanket neatly draped across it. 

All in all, it looks very inviting, and Loki, in this moment, would like nothing better than to collapse atop it.

Bruce and Loki look to Stephen expectantly, waiting for him to portal them to their own rooms.

“What?” Stephen questions, walking up to the countertop table to the right to toss away his sling ring on it and stretch sleepily. “Don’t look at me. I’m not portalling to four separate locations.” 

Well, _fair_ , considering how tired they all are, but that implies the four of them sleep right here and only one bed does create certain logistical difficulties.

“One bed?” Loki questions, frowning, even though he doesn’t _really_ mind. “What’s this? Dubious slash fanfiction with no standards?”

“Well, we can make it that if you wanna.” Tony yawns a massive yawn, eyes visibly drooping. “I know I’m irresistible.”

“I’m into nobody, Tony, and you know that,” Loki reminds him, using the last dredges of his exhausted magic to turn his casual Asgardian robes into a green full-sleeved Midgardian nightrobe and pyjamas, because he has found that they are much more comfortable. “Nothing personal.”

“I’m mostly into science,” Bruce adds, placing his glasses on the countertop table, decidedly unbothered by the idea of changing into something more comfortable than a shirt and jeans, or more likely, simply too tired. “And sometimes, also girls.”

“I _am_ into guys,” Stephen says, wasting absolutely no time in tossing away his sweatshirt in the air and claiming the right side of the bed. “Except you’re not my type.”

“Cool.” Tony nods in acknowledgement. “Ace, grey and pan in that order, right? I'm bi, but you know that.”

“Can we leave discussions of sexuality for a time when none of us are dying of exhaustion?” says Stephen, already tucking himself under the blanket on the extreme right side of the bed, picking up a second pillow to place it on his right and wrapping his arms around it. 

Loki hums tiredly in agreement. The only one he’s ever been interested in is the Tesseract, anyway.

“You sure four fully grown adults can fit into one bed?” questions Bruce, asking the important questions, but not really seeming concerned about the answers, if the fact that he is already climbing into the bed to lie down right beside Stephen says anything.

“Dunno. Don’t care. Portal to your own bed if you have a problem,” Stephen grumbles in reply, shifting in the bed to make himself more comfortable. “Goodnight.”

Oh well, if Loki is going to have to sacrifice arm and leg stretching space and share a blanket with three other people for getting to sleep right now, then so be it. He’s too exhausted to mourn the loss of leg-stretching space.

Tony seems to agree, but finds his preferred position otherwise occupied by one Stephen Strange. “Aight, move over, asshole,” he grunts out, jabbing his side in an attempt to push him to the left.

“Crawl in from the _other side_ , Tony,” Stephen groans back, not budging an inch and hugging the pillow around his arms tighter, lest somebody decide to snatch it, which, in Loki’s opinion, somebody _should_ because there are exactly four pillows and there’s no way Stephen gets to have two.

"It's _my_ bed, Dumbledore, and the right side is mine," Tony persists. "Move."

“I’m not moving, Go fuck yourself.”

“Fuck me yourself, coward,” replies Tony, yanking the pillow from under his arms and hitting him with it on the head to Stephen’s very agitated protests, “and more importantly, _move_.”

“ _Make me_ , _bastard_ ,” challenges Stephen, not budging an inch despite Tony's attempts. He does look very angry on losing the pillow though, and it serves him _right,_ in Loki’s utterly unbiased opinion.

“Shut _up_ ,” Bruce groans out, shifting closer to Stephen to make space for Loki and Tony on the left side.

Loki, untying his messy hair and placing the rubber-band on the nightstand to the left, follows Bruce, perching himself warmly within the blanket beside him, second to the left.

Which means that unless Tony can make all three of them move, the only place left for him is the leftmost extreme.

“I hate you all,” he grumbles, before sighing and joining them, tucking himself under the blanket beside Loki. 

A blanket that will be all Loki’s, come morning, because Loki _hoards_ , and he hoards _very greedily_ , a fact that Loki is proud of to no end because of how much it always annoys Thor. 

Tony does not need to know this, however.

“You’re very welcome, Tony,” murmurs Loki, shifting to the right to make space for him. Apparently, Loki is going to be sandwiched between the two scientists tonight, and surprisingly finds that he does not mind that in the least. 

Besides, they’re both very short, which means extra space for Loki.

“I’m going to make you all regret it by snoring very, _very_ loudly,” Tony threatens, prompting Loki to amend his earlier thoughts. Because snores are _unacceptable_.

“If I awake because of your snores, Tony, I _will_ proceed to kick you from the bed,” Loki warns sleepily. He probably won’t actually do it, honestly, even if he _does_ end up snoring, because Loki is used to sleeping to the tune of the loudest snores in the universe, courtesy of Thor, and Tony is too squishy to be thrown out like that, but it’s the principle of the words that matters.

“Ooh, kinky,” Tony mumbles. “It’s not the _only_ thing we can do in bed though...” he suggests, and Loki finds himself amending his earlier thoughts yet again. Maybe he _does_ deserve to be kicked out a little bit, principles be damned. 

A pity he’s squishy.

“Yeah, here’s another: going the fuck to sleep,” replies Bruce loudly, turning around towards Loki and stretching his left leg to land on Loki’s own legs.

Loki would usually object to such an impertinent appropriation of Loki’s leg space, but he finds that Bruce’s legs are surprisingly not cold unlike his own, and lets the insolence slide.

“Where’s the fun in that?” Tony asks.

“Weren’t you going to collapse within two minutes?” questions Strange, annoyed and trying his best to bury himself into the pillow, _singular_ , beneath his head to try to drown out their conversation. Loki can't say he doesn't exactly relate. 

“Sleep is for the weak,” Tony yawns out. 

“Well, do see yourself out then,” Loki suggests, wrapping his arms cosily around him. It's warm, and comfy, and a massive pity.

“I’m going to ignore that comment because I know you love me very much, Lokes,” he mumbles in reply, smirking. 

“Yes, and I’m going to express that with a kick that _will_ result in broken hipbones, Tony, if you don’t shut up _right this second_ ,” Loki warns, and this time he means it. Loki isn’t sure he has the strength to follow through, however.

“Hmm, I wonder what other way of expressing love could result in broken hipbones, with your superstrength involved.”

“Unlike you heathens, _I_ actually have _work_ in the morning,” Stephen groans out, “so _shut up_.” 

Loki sleepily notes that this level of exasperation probably shouldn’t be possible for a normal human who hasn’t seen an ounce of sleep in at least thirty-six hours, and finds himself vaguely impressed. 

But mostly tired.

“Is it too dangerous to say, make me?” 

“Tony, I swear to the Norns that if you make _one_ more terrible dirty joke, you _will_ wake up with a live snake in place of your penis,” Loki warns, sleepily snuggling further into Tony’s shoulder. “Consider this a threat.”

“Whatever you say, Bambi.” Tony pats him in the back, yawning as he does so. “Whatever you say.”

* * *

For the next week hereafter, Loki finds Steve strangely avoiding him, Tony, Stephen, and Bruce, while Tony seems to regard his AI with a newfound sense of pride.

Loki does not know why.

**Author's Note:**

> Loki hogs blankets and none of you can convince me otherwise.
> 
> This could probably have turned out better but it was written between 12 and 3 AM and only edited and beta'd (by two people, in fact, @worstloki and @Hydrophius, they're amazing and go check them out!!!!) at a less godless hour, so both Loki and the author were pretty tired. Plus, I think it works as a tiny semi-crack plotless fluff fic.
> 
> Not very explicitly stated in the fic, but Bruce is hetero-greysexual, which means experiencing mild or very infrequent sexual attraction, but towards the opposite gender. Het-acespecs and het-arospecs are all hella valid, and I'll fight you on that.
> 
> We need more fics with Ace!Loki. We need more fics with aspec rep in general. Seriously, aspecs are horrendously underrepresented in even fanfiction, let alone mainstream media. We need more platonic fics too. Is that too much to ask?
> 
> Thanks for reading! Comments are always appreciated!!!!


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